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TUESDAY: Parking & park, @ Junction Neighborhood Organization

For the first time in almost a decade, SDOT is reviewing parking in The Junction. Department reps will talk about it at the Junction Neighborhood Organization‘s next meeting, tomorrow (Tuesday, September 19th). Here’s the “fact sheet” for the review, just added to the city website today:

(Click image for full-size PDF on city website)
Q&A is promised, too. (Whether or not you’ll be there, the city’s just opened this online survey as part of the review.)

Also on the JuNO agenda: Next steps for the future Junction park in the 4700 block of 40th SW, following the recent “open house” – Seattle Parks reps including project manager Karimah Edwards will be there. And with the final HALA Mandatory Housing Affordability Environmental Impact Statement and its proposed upzoning maps due soon, the JuNO Land Use Committee will present an update, too. All welcome at tomorrow night’s meeting, 6:30 pm, at the Senior Center/Sisson Building (4217 SW Oregon).

In case my perspective is helpful as someone who recently moved from Columbia City to West Seattle:

Jonathan Williams of SDOT – he’s mentioned in the handout as leading the study – did a great job over the past couple of years doing a similar study in Columbia City. I served on the CC Parking Advisory Group that he convened. It brought together residents, business owners and landlords that all have different parking needs. SDOT survey data show that potential customers are having a hard time finding open parking spaces.

While Columbia City has had Residential Parking Zone 29 since light rail opened in 2009 it’s avoided parking meters until this fall. SDOT has developed a plan to make better use of the limited on street parking between expanding RPZ 29 and making certain blocks in the commercial core paid parking. Today there are still a few block faces in the heart of CC that have zero time limits (this will be changing as part of this plan). Columbia City and other southeast neighborhoods have the unusual parking demand of “hide and ride” commuters who board light rail or even leave their cars for a week while they go on vacation via the airport. While I think several blocks of paid on-street parking will work well for Columbia City businesses to retain and attract customers we’ll really see what happens in October or November.

One of the things I’m interested to see is to what extent parking demand is pushed a couple of blocks away from the core of CC with these new restrictions and charges. Blocks that today have plenty of available parking may be finding it scarce.

@Scott A, parking is already “pushed a couple of blocks away from the core”. Commuter parking is already choking my neighborhood and creating dangerous intersections. We were told that the worst four spaces will not be restricted because there have not been enough reported accidents or a death on that intersection.

Max 34: What you call wasted space, others call needed access. I want to take a quick trip to the bakery or Husky deli, park in the lot, get my stuff and go. A bus trip will take WAY too long. I will not take the bus to go to dinner, and we live too far away to walk, especially in bad weather. Taking away parking will push us to White Center/Burien. The parking lots keeps me going to the junction. We don’t need more boxy ugly apodments.

AJ, parking that is paid for by the users and that has time limits would help you find short term parking for those quick trips to the bakery or Husky Deli. Paid parking promotes turnover.

There is no “free parking” at the Junction. It all costs money, subsidized by all taxpayers and by the businesses. The cost paid by the businesses is built into the cost of everything you buy there, whether you arrive on foot, by bike, on a bus or in a car. The car drivers who use the parking are subsidized by the customers who do not drive.

We’ll have our coverage of tonight’s meeting up in the morning – the murder on 31st takes precedence over everything else for the rest of the night, but we did cover it. To Don’s point, Lora Swift noted at the meeting that the Junction Association (which she runs as executive director) merchants pay five-digit rent each month for the use of the “three hours free” lots.

Parking has indeed been pushed into the Junction neighborhoods already. I can rarely park in front of my house anymore and I have downgraded to a tiny car. I also see my neighbors parking blocks away from their homes on a daily basis. Paid parking will accelerate this and then the City will take “surprised” notice of neighborhood congestion and make residents pay for monthly/yearly permits to park by their homes. I also very much appreciate that Junction merchants pay for quick parking access to their businesses so I can shop locally. Please don’t turn us into another seriously congested Capitol Hill.

I don’t mind paying for parking. I do mind having to go find the meter, get the sticker, go back to the car, put the sticker in the window, etc all with toddlers in tow. Particularly when it’s raining. It’s one thing if you’re going to, say, the Aquarium for a few hours. But if you’re just stopping at a store for 10 minutes to pick up one or two items? I’ll just take my dollars elsewhere. (And I do love some of the stores at the Junction…)

I haven’t come across a meter in Seattle that doesn’t have the option to pay via smartphone, and you don’t have to return to your car to do anything (i.e. put a sticker on your car), so you won’t have to give up shopping at the Junction if that’s the deal breaker. It’s really a nice way to do it if you’re in a hurry too!

West Seattle north of Genessee is incredibly underserved by transit, and those areas that are served by transit have infrequent and time consuming trips. With increasing density there are more cars in the area and more people will continue to use their cars until bus service becomes more frequent and timely. Much of the parking problem is exacerbated by “hide and ride” because the only frequent bus service for most of us is the overcrowded Rapid Ride C. Bringing back some more service to the 56, 57 and 37 bus routes that were decimated after the Metro cuts would take a lot of pressure off of parking in the Alaska Junction.

New condos on California with one parking spot per 2-3 bedroom condos and townhouses? Guess where they park on the next block over. 7 story condos in the junction with 1 or NO parking spaces provided? Guess where they park… in the adjacent neighborhood streets where others also need to park that live there.

People that would like to drive down to the junction in their neighborhood and have dinner…. are screwed!

No one is building condos – it’s all apartments, some townhouses, a few single-family houses. The city rule change in 2012 is what made it possible for developers to omit parking spaces if “frequent transit service” is nearby, and those rules are currently proposed to be loosened further, as we reported last week:

There are very few places a mobile, senior citizen can enjoy their mobility. Parking access is a critical issue, even with a handicap permit and the Junction community parking lot is essential to this segment of our community.

Developers, in my opinion have had a great bargain at our expense with the damage and lack of planning of our infrastructure. It’s time for developers to pay their fair share in pain and dollars.

MAX34; What you call “wasted space” is critical access. What you call “wasted space” is our community. If you think further density is an answer, you might want to head downtown at 7:00 a.m. from West Seattle… If you really even live in West Seattle. My apologies if your post was meant as sarcasm.

A lot of people don’t realize that disabled parking permits allow free parking at metered spaces and RPZ time restrictions don’t apply. Both of these tools in SDOT’s tool kit actually help people with disabled parking placards since it’s more likely spaces will actually be available when these are implemented.

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